Spanish views from a small town

Thoughts and observations on life during the pandemic.  After midnight last night, I turned off the television. I was the only one up in the house, aside from the cats, but the silence was eery. I slowly realized there were no cars going by, at all, due to the curfew. It was quieter even than during the worst days of lockdown in April.  This morning, while driving, everything seemed normal until I saw the first person walking by on the sidewalk. Mask. Masks everywhere. Some were patterned cloth. Many were surgical, as if the owner wanted to be able to throw it away as soon as the obligation to wear it was lifted, and keep no souvenir in the house of these troubled times.  After passing my car's inspection (finally!), I went into town to look for something. Every store I went into, I was reminded to use alcoholic gel on my hands. It didn't matter that I had already done it two minutes earlier, in another establishment, and hadn't touched anything. My hands were cleaner tha...

Everyone has a routine. Everyone creates their own daily schedule, whether consciously or not. Get up at this hour, eat this for breakfast, leave the house at this hour, on Thursdays get a doughnut, Saturdays watch this program, etc. A routine helps cement our lives and anticipate what comes next. It gives us a sense of safety and control.  Sometimes, we feel stifled and want to break with our daily routine. So we go on vacation, or do things slightly differently, like go out to eat on Friday instead of Saturday. Even then, we create a new routine. It's extremely difficult to give in to total serendipity and do things on impulse for any period of time longer than one day. The first day of vacation can be serendipitous, but it sets the precedent for the second day, with a few variations inherent to the vacation itself.  Those are the pleasant changes in routine. Then there are the changes imposed by illness, hospitalization, and unemployment. It becomes demoralizing to have...